Do we love old places just because they’re old?

On the contrary, new research in neuroscience and other fields is beginning to tease out specific geometric properties that shape the richness of the past – and too often, the poverties of the present

ABOVE, Two environments not far from one another in London. Left: Seven Dials, dating from the late 17th century. Right: a typical office complex from the 20th century. These environments can be better understood as geometric structures manifesting specific measurable properties. Image credits: Left, John Sutton via Wikimedia Commons. Right: Michael Mehaffy.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article is part of a series of discussion posts contributing to the 62nd International Making Cities Livable (IMCL) conference in Potsdam, Germany, 15-18 October, 2025.

POTSDAM, GERMANY - Walk through almost any historic city center in the world, and a curious phenomenon plays out. People slow down, look up, smile. They take photos, sit in plazas, lean against old walls, meet friends under cornices and clocks. Something about these older places seems to resonate. “Charm,” we often say, or “character.” We chalk it up to nostalgia, or cultural memory, or maybe the warm glow of patina and time.

But new research suggests there’s something more going on—rooted not in sentimentality, but in human perception, cognition, and biology.

Recent research in neuroscience, environmental psychology, and architectural theory suggests that the architecture of the past isn’t appealing simply because it’s old. Instead, it may be more fundamentally aligned with the way human beings experience and interpret the built environment. Traditional buildings—whether Chinese courtyard houses, Moroccan riads, European townhouses, or Japanese machiya—share certain underlying spatial patterns and visual properties that modern buildings, particularly those built after around 1930, often lack.

This discovery invites us to reframe a familiar question: Are we drawn to old buildings just because they’re old? Or are we responding to something more intrinsic—something these buildings do, cognitively and emotionally?

A Different Kind of Sophistication

To some, traditional architecture may seem “quaint,” “simple,” or even “primitive”—a leftover from a time before modern materials and methods gave us glass towers and sculptural forms. But that view misses something essential. These older forms of architecture are in fact highly sophisticated—not in terms of high-tech materials, but in how they engage the human mind and body.

One key example comes from the field of cognitive psychology. In the 1950s, George A. Miller introduced the concept of “chunking,” which describes how humans process information in manageable groups. Traditional buildings do something similar: they organize elements like windows, arches, and ornament into visual clusters and sub-clusters that are easy to read. In contrast, many modern buildings feature vast blank walls, stark uniformity, or abstract forms that are harder to “chunk.” The result? A cognitive load that is heavier, and less pleasurable.

Then there’s fractal geometry. Traditional environments often show repeating patterns at different scales—a doorway with panels, a courtyard with layered edges, a street that reveals itself gradually through smaller openings. These patterns mirror those found in nature, and studies in neuroscience have shown that people respond positively—even physiologically—to such patterns. Blood pressure decreases, attention improves, and feelings of well-being increase when people view environments rich in natural or fractal forms.

Many modernist buildings, by contrast, intentionally avoided these characteristics. Architects of the 20th century sought to break with the past—to strip away ornament, reject symmetry, and embrace pure abstraction. But in doing so, they also stripped away some of the very elements that connect buildings to the human organism.

Symmetry, Scale, and Sense

Christopher Alexander, the architect and design theorist, spent decades studying what makes certain buildings and spaces feel “alive.” In his four-volume work The Nature of Order, he identified fifteen structural properties that occur repeatedly in environments that people find beautiful, comforting, and coherent. These include features like:

• Levels of scale – patterns and forms that repeat across different sizes

• Local symmetries – balance that is centered and relational, rather than rigidly imposed

• Positive space – forms that define and enliven the spaces around them

• Gradients – gentle transitions in size, density, or intensity

• Roughness – minor imperfections that contribute to an overall sense of harmony

Some of Alexander's "Fifteen Properties" as they arose spontaneously in traditional buildings.

Traditional architecture embodies these properties almost universally—not because of any ideological or symbolic intent (which can vary enormously, of course), but because these patterns emerged naturally, through generations of trial and error. Builders intuitively created forms that fit the body, the climate, the materials, and the culture. And they did so in ways that supported orientation, comprehension, social interaction, and well-being.

By contrast, many modern buildings are dominated by singular ideas or visual effects, often with few layers of structure or scale. The result can be buildings that are visually striking—but also confusing, alienating, or difficult to inhabit.

But Weren’t Traditional Buildings Political Symbols?

Some critics argue that traditional architecture is tied to outdated ideologies, or worse, oppressive regimes of the past -- but that’s a misconception. It’s true that fascist or authoritarian governments have sometimes co-opted classical architecture—but so have democracies, religious communities, indigenous cultures, and peasants. The forms themselves are not ideological—they are structural, spatial, and human.

Claiming an ideological association is like saying that the alphabet is ideological because it was used by dictators and slaveholders. Of course, no one seriously argues that because of this association, we should stop using words or language. The same is true for traditional forms of design—they are tools, developed over time, to meet human needs.

And indeed, traditional architecture is not one thing—it is a vast, diverse family of approaches shaped by different materials, climates, and cultures. What unites them is not a single style, but a set of structural principles that respond to human perception and bodily experience.

What This Means Today

None of this is an argument for going back in time or rejecting modern technology. Rather, it’s an invitation to bring forward what was best in traditional architecture—those patterns that support human well-being—and to combine them with contemporary insights and capabilities.

This is already happening. New urbanist developments are borrowing traditional forms to create walkable, sociable, human-scaled places - often very successfully, as new research shows. Neuroscientists are working with architects to design environments that reduce stress and enhance cognitive function. Planners are rediscovering the importance of local identity and complexity in urban design.

These efforts aren’t about copying the past. They’re about recovering lost knowledge—about how the built environment can support our health, our understanding, and our happiness.

The Timeless in the Familiar

That makes it clear that we don'e love old buildings just because they’re old. We love them because they speak to us—visually, physically, emotionally—in a language we’ve always understood, even if we don’t always know why.

Thanks to new research, we’re beginning to understand the why. And that gives us a chance to do better—not by idolizing the past, but by learning from it. Because a building isn’t just a machine, or a sculpture, or a manifesto. It’s a place for life. And when it’s shaped with care, coherence, and human meaning, we feel it—sometimes without even knowing it.

That’s not primitive. That’s profound.

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Founded in 1985, the IMCL is a unique peer-to-peer gathering of city leaders, researchers and practitioners, sharing the latest knowledge and research into action on making cities livable. For more information: https://www.imcl.online/

The Many Spinoff Benefits of Urban Climate Action

Debates too often focus on narrow disaster preparedness or emissions reductions, overlooking the many other immediate quality-of-life benefits

ABOVE: A street in Amsterdam that is both climate-friendly and highly livable.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is one in a series of topics for exploration and debate at the upcoming International Making Cities Livable (IMCL) conference in Potsdam, Germany, October 15-18, 2025.

Michael W Mehaffy

One of the major challenges in dealing with the climate threat -- when we deal with it at all -- is that people assume it comes at the expense of other, more immediate social and economic goals. Too often, action on climate is seen as something that has to compromise the well-being of citizens today.

But in fact, most of the actions we need to take to mitigate and adapt to climate change are actions that will also improve our immediate well-being and quality of life. These are actions that will make our cities, towns and suburbs measurably and tangibly more livable, in the here and now.

Livable cities have always been the central topic from the beginning for the International Making Cities Livable (IMCL) conference series since its founding in 1985 by Henry Lennard, a Viennese medical sociologist, and Suzanne Lennard, a British architectural scholar. That focus will continue at our 62nd conference in Potsdam, Germany, 15-18 October. Potsdam is a beautiful and historic city in the Berlin region, easily accessible by rail from Berlin's airport and central city. October is an excellent time to travel in Germany, with fewer crowds, better availability and cost, and crisp autumn weather.

The theme of the conference is, “What is the Architecture of the (Livable) Future?" Too much of the debate on "the architecture of our time" seems to be about futuristic imagery, or greenwashing, or exotic but irrelevant approaches to large-scale sculptural art. Missing is a hard-nosed consideration of the ways we can make real progress for people and planet, guided by research evidence and case studies. We will explore evidence for the proposition that progress on climate action must go hand in hand with progress on livability.

"Progress on livability" is, in a nutshell, the mission of the International Making Cities Livable conferences. The IMCL brings together researchers, practitioners, city leaders, NGO heads, students and other key urban actors from across international borders, to share lessons and follow the evidence to drive forward positive change. The last conference included over 50 speakers from every continent except Antarctica.

This year we will examine, among other topics, the many spinoff benefits for cities that take action to adapt and mitigate in response to the climate threat -- if they do so in a coordinated, "joined-up" way.

First of all, of course, we can agree that a city is not livable if it experiences weather-related disasters, or if it has not adapted for thermal comfort and survival in the wake of increasing heat stress events. More fundamentally, a city is not contributing to livability if it allows its emissions and their impacts to run out of control.

But there are more immediate ways that a city's livability can overlap with climate-friendly goals. Among the climate-responsive actions that can provide immediate livability benefits:

• Urban greening, creating shade, making a more beautiful public realm, supporting walkability and lower-carbon, lower-emissions living;

• Integrated water features, also providing cooling, and when well-designed, supporting improved water quality, reduced runoff, and lower flooding risk;

• Removal of asphalt, including excess parking and roadways, reducing urban heating, replacing excess paving with cool surfaces and vegetation to reduce urban heating, improve thermal comfort, and raise albedo (sunlight reflected back into space without global warming);

• Cool surfaces, reducing urban heating, increasing reflectance, raising albedo;

• Building forms that promote natural ventilation, promoting thermal comfort and avoiding heat stress;

• Green zones that protect from flooding and also provide open space;

• "Blue-green networks," integrated systems of interconnected green and blue spaces like parks and waterways, designed to manage stormwater, reduce flooding, and enhance urban environments.

ABOVE: A climate-friendly area in Oslo, Norway -- and a very livable one, combining urban greening, water bodies, cool surfaces, building forms that provide natural ventilation -- and a walkable, compact, mixed-use and multi-modal urban form.

Above all, the most important climate action we can take -- while also increasing livability -- is to assure that the city form is walkable, compact, and mixed in uses and amenities, with a variety of choices in how to get around. As research has shown, this is a powerful determinant of the level of greenhouse gas emissions generated per person. It is also strongly predictive of how well a city can cope with climate disasters, and even work to avoid them in the first place.

The research shows that traditional city form – the walkable, compact, mixed use patterns that were common up to about 1930 - also provides the “social infrastructure“ that is needed to support resilience and adaptation, and even to save lives. Traditional city form also provides support for more efficient, low-resource and low-emissions lifestyles that still offer a high degree of livability and quality of life.  

More conventional or “modern” city form – built upon the automobile and other machinery, and segregating the city into machine-like parts – can also afford a very prosperous and healthy lifestyle, at least for those with sufficient income. But it must do so only with very high consumption and depletion of resources, and resulting high emissions. Increasingly, it is apparent that this way of doing things is simply not sustainable.

Even for those skeptics who would rather focus only upon financial considerations, it is apparent that modern city form carries high (if often hidden) costs to  municipalities, and ultimately to taxpayers. Research is showing that the cost of maintaining and repairing infrastructure, and providing municipal services like fire, ambulance and police, can become exponentially higher in more sprawling, low density urban forms.

We may wish that we could ignore all these trends, and go on with business as usual (as frankly so many of us do). But the trends will not ignore us. It is increasingly apparent that a transition is coming in how we build cities and towns, and do many of the other things that have an impact on people and planet. The only question is whether this transition will be on our terms, or on much more disagreeable terms forced upon us.

However, this is not a burden, but an opportunity -- to make more livable neighborhoods that are healthier, more enduring, more beautiful, and ultimately more joyful.

When it comes to cities, how did we get here? We used to think we were "modern" and sophisticated, when we pulled apart the components of the city and reconnected them with machinery (cars, infrastructure, etc), and by demolishing older buildings and neighborhoods, replacing them with all-new "rationally planned" developments. We largely abandoned the inner cities, leaving them as relics at best or wastelands at worst, and we mostly headed for the new dispersed, car-dependent suburbs, with their boxy corporate office parks and shopping malls surrounded by massive parking lots, and their vast monocultures of drive-to houses.

Too much of the world is still built this way, and if anything, the trend is accelerating in many places. The implications for climate impacts, resource depletion, ecological destruction, long-term economics including municipal finance, health and well-being -- in a word, livability -- are profound.

ABOVE, a 1948 drawing by the German architect Adolf Bayer, showing what at that time was thought to be a more "modern" and "rational" city on the left, and a "messy" and "crowded" traditional city on the right -- "order" and "disorder". History has shown the flaws of this way of thinking.

This was not the inevitable result of pure market forces or economic dictates. It was, in fact, the outcome of a conscious theory about what cities are, developed and implemented through massive government and corporate efforts. And we now have undeniable evidence that the theory was wrong.

The 1948 drawing by Adolf Bayer (above) encapsulates this idea perfectly. Instead of the crowded, diseased, "disordered" city, we would have a sanitized, rationalized, "orderly" city of pristine machine-like parts. But as Jane Jacobs and others famously observed, this was foolishly naive: it disrespected the more complex forms of order of the traditional city, replacing their complex web-network relationships with simplistic "tree-like" hierarchical relationships.

Most people recognize that this generation of "modern" cities has failed us, and many of us are wallowing in a kind of "post-modern" confusion -- stuck in a warmed-over kind of business-as-usual, unable to see the path forward. Some of us seem desperate to double down on the modernist paradigm, only sticking on some green tech and redoubled social goals, in the hopes that this will make everything OK. In Jane Jacobs' withering words, "the method fails."

But a path forward is there, as the research and the case studies show us.

For one thing, we can find enormous helpful lessons in the treasury of successful evolved patterns and practices of the past -- the ones we recklessly discarded in our rush to be "modern." This is not nostalgia; on the contrary, it's intelligence. Specifically, it's the "collective intelligence" of centuries of human experience, of trial and error, of refinement and improvement. We can tap into the enormous resources of historic buildings and neighborhoods, and moreover, of the still-useful patterns they offer us today.

The research shows that older buildings and neighborhoods offer a number of combined advantages for climate-friendly cities. For one thing, “the greenest building is the one that's already built" – an older building that is retrofitted and adapted for thermal comfort is well positioned to endure for even longer, with a very low annual deficit of embodied energy and materials. That translates into low resource consumption, depletion, and emissions -- and often, buildings and places that are well-loved and cared for.

There is something else that older buildings and neighborhoods teach us, and it is perhaps more controversial than it should be: that is, their aesthetics are proven to be popular and successful over many generations. They tend to endure, unlike the shiny-new object-buildings that quickly age and go out of style. (And there is a remarkable consistency to their popularity among non-architects, who often don't care for the new work of architects.)

New research is beginning to tell us why this is so. These older buildings have complex geometric forms, including fractals, symmetries and other "biophilic" properties, that actually have a measurable effect on human well-being and even health. They create attractive edges of streets and other public spaces, where people are more likely to linker, walk, and interact with one another. They support low-resource consumption, low-carbon, high-enjoyment lifestyles.

Remarkably, research is even beginning to show that there are important benefits for health and well-being, purely from the aesthetic characteristics of buildings and places.

These and other findings have prompted some architecture critics to call for a "big rethink" about the still-common approach to architecture and building. At the 62nd International Making Cities Livable conference, we will explore the research and debate the issues, and we will consider the outlines of a "new architecture." Will it be, in part, a revival of Classical or traditional architectures? A new kind of modern architecture? Or something more "organic," along the lines advocated by Christopher Alexander and others? Or some combination?

We hope you can join us to explore this vitally important question!

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The International Making Cities Livable (IMCL) conference series, hosted by the Lennard Institute for Livable Cities, was begun in 1985 by Henry and Suzanne Lennard. They were both passionate about sharing the best lessons for creating livable, healthy, prosperous cities, towns and suburbs for all. Our flagship conferences are held in beautiful and instructive cities hosted by visionary leaders who are able to share in-depth lessons, both positive and negative. The conferences are peer-to-peer gatherings of city leaders, researchers, practitioners, NGO heads and others who are "in the trenches' driving forward positive change for cities, towns and suburbs. Our last conference in Cortona, Italy in November 2024 included over 50 leading speakers from the Americas, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Attendee comments included “Truly a great conference,” “Fabulous sessions… Wow!,” “It was terrific,” “Thank you for hosting this magnificent event!” and “Thank you for the great conference sessions… [and] the knowledge sharing and inspired messages from people from around the world.”

To learn more about the Potsdam conference, please visit https://www.imcl.online/potsdam-2025.

What is the Architecture of the (Livable) Future?

The 62nd conference of the International Making Cities Livable (IMCL) series will explore the research and lively debates, in the beautiful and inspiring case study of Potsdam, Germany, October 15-18, 2025

ABOVE: Potsdam and the Berlin region offer a wealth of lessons and case studies for livable cities, towns and suburbs.

POTSDAM - The next conference of the International Making Cities Livable - the venerable conference series begun in 1985 - will be held here in this beautiful and historic city, and still a case study of dynamic transformations.

At a time when built environment professions are challenged as never before to meet the pressing needs of people and planet, debates are still raging about the appropriate "architecture of our time." Is it a futuristic vision of strange new shapes, or avant-garde artistic expressions? Is it a continuation of the early 20th century "machine aesthetic" featuring boxy buildings and cities, only with new green features added? Are our buildings (and cars, and cities) still just "machines for living in?"

This is also a time when astonishing new findings from the sciences are providing remarkable insights into the human and biological factors of our urban world. Research in neuroscience, neuroaesthetics, environmental psychology, sociology, medicine, and other fields, are highlighting the inadequacies of conventional methods, and pointing to new approaches and new possibilities.

A growing citizen movement is also rejecting the old conventional methods, and some are demanding a return to traditional and Classical forms. Indeed, research does show that many citizens do not share architects' preferences for aggressively "modern" contemporary buildings, and that the sentiment is remarkably cross-cutting across political, age, gender, and other demographic categories.

Yet there is a persistent idea that the revival of traditional forms and patterns -- proven to be well-loved, successful and enduring over centuries -- is somehow "inauthentic" and inappropriate for a "modern" era. This idea still governs many schools and boardrooms. But is this idea sound? Has it been carefully examined in the light of evidence?

And if it is not sound, is the answer only to return to specific traditional and Classical characteristics? Is this what will be required to create a more livable future? Or is there perhaps another path (or paths) that is more creative, more eclectic, but still more successful from a human and ecological point of view than contemporary practice? We will explore these questions.

However, we will do so with careful consideration of the research evidence -- which its too often missing from many contemporary debates. This, then, will be the theme of the 62nd IMCL conference: "What is the Architecture of the (Livable) Future?" To do so, we will examine the latest research findings from environmental psychology, cognition, neuroscience, sociology, anthropology, medicine, and even physics and mathematics.

Reconstruction of historic Potsdam buildings (below) after demolition of 20th century buildings (above).

Potsdam, Germany is a fitting venue for this exploration. The city has a rich architectural and urban history, up to and beyond the devastation of World War II, and through the reconstruction of modern buildings under the Communist government of East Germany. Since reunification, however, the city has begun to restore many of its traditional and Classical buildings, as well as adding new traditional buildings. Along with these have come lively debates.

We will examine these debates, in Potsdam and beyond, and the case-study evidence from local projects as well as other projects around the globe. We will also evaluate the tools and strategies for implementation.

October is an excellent time to travel in Germany, with lower-cost travel, fewer crowds, and generally beautiful crisp autumn weather. There are also excellent opportunities for side trips to other parts of Germany and Europe.  

The conference will also take up a wide range of these and other timely urban challenges:

• Shaping the critical edges of public space

• Promoting walkability

• Exploring neuroscience, neuroaesthetics and cognitive architecture

• Creating multi-modal travel

• Providing access to daily needs (e.g. "15 minute cities")

• Making resilient climate-friendly and resource-friendly cities

• Creating affordable and diverse housing for all

• Exploiting biophilia and nature-based solutions

• Creating markets, local foods and local economies

• Making better public spaces (including streets) with great placemaking tools

• Promoting healthier cities for people and planet

• Frontiers of architectural and urban research: What do we know, what do we need to know, and how do we disseminate it?

Begun in 1985, the IMCL is a a unique international, interdisciplinary, peer-to-peer conference of city leaders, built environment researchers, professionals, and NGO heads, with intimate (around 100 attendees) gatherings at instructive and inspiring case study locales, to share the latest knowledge and the most effective tools and strategies to meet our pressing urban challenges.

Speakers at our most recent conference in October 2024 included over 50 city leaders from the Americas, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Attendee comments included “Truly a great conference,” “Fabulous sessions… Wow!,” “It was terrific,” “Thank you for hosting this magnificent event!” and “Thank you for the great conference sessions… [and] the knowledge sharing and inspired messages from people from around the world.”

For more information, or to submit a no-obligation abstract for presentation at the conference, visit https://www.imcl.online/potsdam-2025.